Land Sakes (11 page)

Well, I stuffed cotton among the jewels in my apron, and that worked fine. We got down to the saloon a little
after 5:00, and I was relieved to see another bartender mixing drinks. It must have been Singapore Sling's day off. I ordered a glass of ginger ale, and even though I took my time, I finished it before Mrs. Winchester was ready to quit. She went on drinking until she was too soused to go to dinner. I managed to get her back to the suite, and Mary, the maid, took over so I could go down and eat a bite.

By the time I got back upstairs, Mrs. Winchester was propped up in bed and was all wound up talking. I let Mary go, and I settled on the chaise lounge to listen.

“Miss E., I had a wonderful... wonderful childhood... toys... games... maids and nannies who never let me out of their sight.”

If I heard
wonderful childhood
one more time, I would be obliged to change that broken record one way or another.

“I had private lessons...” Those pudgy fingers toying with the sheet made me notice her nails; they were orchid like the dress she had worn that day. Since she had not had a manicure, it didn't take a rocket scientist to know they were press-on nails. She mumbled on. “I had lessons in art... music... dancing... Some of my teachers... most of the teachers lived with us on the third floor... but a few came from the outside to teach me art, music...”

A tear trickled down from her good eye. I put a box of tissues on the bed where she could reach them. “Miss E., I never learned to paint or sing... or dance... but I did look forward to seeing those teachers... the ones who
came from the outside... They even smelled different... smelled of smoke... of food cooking...”

It was the liquor making her spill her guts and ramble so, but I believed what she was telling me. I was beginning to get a handle on this
wonderful childhood
she was talking about. To my way of thinking, she had been a little girl shut up with grown people who were paid to take care of her. So far she had not shown me one
wonderful
thing about that.

“The ones who lived in the house... they never let me out of their sight... They tried to teach me math... science... Latin... French... I was nine years old before I could read English... I never learned Latin or French.”

For a minute, she stopped talking, and it was plain as day she wanted another drink, but she wouldn't ask. I felt sorry for her. Looking at her, with half her face dry and the other half wet with tears, made me realize I was seeing a picture of what was going on inside of her—one half telling me she had had a wonderful childhood and the other half crying her eye out over what was the truth. Splurgeon said, “What is in the well will come up in the bucket of speech,” and that was sure happening before my very eyes.

“Mrs. Winchester, Percival tells me we drive to Chicago tomorrow. Don't you think—”

“After my accident I had... I had scarlet fever. They put me in the hospital for that too...” Her cheeks flushed, and she raised her voice. “Miss E., I will never... I will
never
go to another hospital as long as I live...
as long as I live! Do you hear? I hate hospitals! I hate doctors!”

I was glad to see that something got her dander up. “You had an accident?”

“Yes. I had an accident. A very bad accident. When I was four I fell off my pony... That's when I lost my eye... Do you know that I have an artificial eye?”

I didn't want to answer, so I kept quiet.

“Yes, you saw it, didn't you?” She looked away from me. “I spent a lot of time in hospitals... months... in one hospital after another. Two guards stood at my door... only my nanny visited me.”

“Your nanny? Didn't your parents come?”

“Oh no. They never even knew me.” A bitter little smile curled her lip.

Even though I was curious, I wished she would stop talking, considering how upset she was. But she didn't.

“I never knew my parents,” she told me. “Soon after I was born they divorced.” She pressed a tissue against her quivering lips; several minutes passed before she could go on. “The maids told me my mother was an actress. They told me she lived in Beverly Hills when she was not on tour... She's dead, of course.”

I got up and brought a wastebasket to the side of the bed so she could gather up the wet tissues and get rid of them. “And your daddy?” I asked.

“My father lived abroad... played polo, I think... Had something to do with horses... yes, horses.”

I could see how this woman could make herself sick over all this, and I didn't want to see that happen. Splur
geon says, “Raking the ashes of the past” don't do nobody good. In Mrs. Winchester's “ashes” there wasn't a single live coal that I could see. I suggested we turn in for the night. I don't think she heard me. She kept right on talking.

“My grandfather disinherited my father. I don't know why... Maybe he was like me... maybe he couldn't do the things required of him... I like to think that...”

It was pitiful, but this was no pity party. All she was doing was raking those ashes, hoping to find something good, something to make it all worthwhile. I figured those nannies and nurses must have kept telling her she had a wonderful childhood because she lived in a mansion and had all the toys she wanted. At least she was still trying to believe that, but in my mind the sooner she shucked that idea and faced the facts, the better off she would be. “So you were left to live with your grandfather?”

“You might say so. I lived in his Newport home... but he was never there. After he disinherited my father... after he did that, I was his only heir... He made sure nothing happened to me.” She blew her nose and absently dangled the tissue over the basket before dropping it. “To make sure... to make sure I never had another accident... not another one like that one, he had my pony shot...”

That went through me like a knife. What kind of a man would shoot a little girl's pony? I didn't need to hear anything more; if that man had still been alive, I would have personally punched out his lights! Of course, he must have been long dead. I looked at Mrs. Winchester
and thought to myself,
She could have been the poster child for all the poor little rich girls of this world
.

“They told me my grandfather was afraid I would be kidnapped... There had been a ransom note, they said, a note telling him... telling him to give them money or they would kidnap me.”

“Did he give them money?”

“I don't know. All I know is, he hired two men to guard me... to guard his heir... his only heir... twenty-four hours a day.”

If I had been her, you can bet your bottom dollar I would have run away; I would have got out of that situation. But not Mrs. Winchester; raised like she was, she couldn't have got away nor survived.

It was getting harder and harder to listen to all this misery. But when Mrs. Winchester started up again, her face lit up, and I thought she was going to tell me something good, maybe about some prank or other. “When I wasn't taking lessons or playing with my toys, there was this... this tiny balcony outside my window... I could sit out there and watch the gardeners working in the yard... the groomsmen exercising the horses.”

Well, that sounded as pitiful as anything she had said before. But she wasn't finished. She was quiet for a few minutes then, smiling, went on. “When I was a little girl, if the hem of my dress turned up... they told me to make a wish... make a wish and kiss it... and my wish would come true.”

“I used to do that too,” I said. “What did you wish for?”

She giggled. “My wish was that somebody
would
kidnap me!”

I laughed too. “You don't mean it!”

“Yes, I do. Nobody ever kidnapped me, but they might yet. Wouldn't that be wonderful?”

“Wonderful?”

“Can't you just see the headlines—‘Mrs. Winifred Win
chus
ter, Wife of Philip Win
chus
ter, Kidnapped and Held for Ransom'?”

“Well, I hope that don't happen!”

“Miss E., that would be fun, fun, fun!”

She was dead serious.
Is she wacko or what
? “Mrs. Winchester, what about your daughter, Barbara? That would worry her to death.”

“Oh, she's not my daughter.”

“Not your daughter!”

“No, she's Philip's daughter.”

“What do you mean? He's your husband, right?”

“Oh, I guess you could call him that... Barbara is the daughter of one of his mistresses... He has full custody of Barbara, and she will inherit his estate.”

“You mean—”

“Miss E., let me tell you why Philip married me.”

“No, that's none of my business.”

“Please, I want to tell you. You see, my grandfather knew I had no head for business... He wanted me to be married to a man who could manage all these businesses and things... somebody he trusted. He picked Philip... Philip was working in one of the export offices... He was twenty years old without a penny to his name. Philip had nothing but brains and a driving... a driving
ambition... My grandfather picked him and offered him my hand in marriage... Of course, not without attorneys and legal papers drawn up to make sure Philip never divorced me or stole my money.”

This sounded like something out of an old movie, yet, knowing what I knew about that grandfather, I believed every word of it.

“I had always been a roly-poly child... roly-poly, yes... that's what they called it. At the time of my coming-out I was still overweight. Being fat, plus my artificial eye, did not make me the most desirable debutante, much less a bride. Even so, Philip agreed to marry me.”

“Well, Mrs. Winchester, I don't mean to speak out of turn, but didn't you have anything to say about that?”

“Oh, I was grateful to have a husband. Philip was handsome, still is. Given time, I hoped we might have a happy marriage.”

Although I knew the answer, I had to ask. “Did you?”

“Miss E., we had a wedding and a honeymoon, but we've never had a marriage.”

Those words shook me to my toenails. I'd had enough of this misery. “Mrs. Winchester, it's getting late. Don't you think we better go to sleep?”

Without a word she rolled over in the bed, and I started straightening the cover over her. She caught my hand and, looking up at me with the saddest face ever I saw, asked, “Miss E., will you call me Winnie?”

Winnie
? “Mrs. Winchester, I'll have to think about that.”

11

The next morning we were up early, and as we were getting in the car, Percival announced that it was a six and a half hour drive to Chicago. “Well,” I said, “this is the Lord's Day, and I would like to stop along the way for church.”

The way he took off his cap and slapped his thigh showed he didn't like that one bit, but before he could say anything, Mrs. Winchester spoke up. “To be sure, we will. We'll stop.”

Percival drew in his breath. “Madam, may I suggest that we allow only one half hour for this delay?”

“Very well.”